I was matched with someone who only gave me very expensive ideas for the esports match. Mechanical keyboards, wireless weighted gaming mice, bluetooth gaming headsets, an Alienware laptop, that $150 Razer controller, a SWITCH, a curved HD monitor, shit like that (then for some reason made sure to mention how much they loved Jeffree Star and would just loooove to have a few of his pallettes). Nothing on their Amazon wishlist was under $150. They'd also mentioned that they had only ever played one video game (and I use that term loosely because it's a browser game). Ever.

I was not about to buy a bunch of expensive PC peripherals for someone who didn't even game (why sign up for an esports exchange if you're not into gaming??). Instead I chose to buy them about $40 worth of Steam games based on their interests from looking at their reddit history, plus made them a list of a good three dozen or so other games they could check out.

They never posted a thank you, and instead sent me a message that said "you didn't get me anything I wanted or asked for but thanks anyway."

Shit like this makes me really not want to participate. My other two giftees loved theirs, but this one bad egg just ruined my entire fucking experience.

I swear I wasn't expecting for Bill Gates' to be my SS, but I really hoped at least some effort would be put on my gift. I made sure the questionnaire as complete as I could so they would have plenty of info to use. What did I get? A tiny melamine cup...I made it obvious that I don't have children so this is utterly useless to me. All I can think is that this person is hoping to get a good present while doing the bare minimum. I know I shouldn't be such a dick about it but it's frustrating when I'm doing my homework to make my giftee something they will love while others can't be bothered.

'Twas the last night for shipping, on the Secret Santa page; Where feeling forgotten, was all the rage; Deadbeat Santas showed off gifts to friends, With no intention to shop or to send;

The giftees sadly refreshed computer screens; Where no tracking information was to be seen; The mods all toiled, at something quite useless; As they cut and they pasted, and made more excuses,

Reading replies revealed quite a clatter, It's about the giving! Your gifts do not matter! If you read quite closely, the rules clearly state:, You don't have to spend money, it's okay to ship late!

Don't come to the sub wanting support; Wanting a gift is greedy! The members retort; No one cares you're left out, everything's fine; There are no problems here, because I got mine!;

To the rest! They cry, defending Reddit Kringle; You should be happy with your can of Pringles! No harsh words should ever be spoken, Appriciate your bottle of polish, already broken!;

A single Pop! Figure! A can of peas! A stuffed bear from the Dollar Tree! A dented can of Campbell's Soup! Novetly soap that's shaped like poop! A used dish rack, a can of Orange Fanta! All reasons to be grateful to your Secret Santa!"

Forgotten and let down, their eyes filled with tears, giftees have experienced everything here, but let me make myself prefectly clear: We're all stupid and will sign up again next year.

Trust me, I know that grumpiness happens. I also get disappointed with RedditGifts and SecretSanta. However, when I created r/secretsanta I created it with one purpose, to be happy, nice and giving. That is and should always be the essence of RedditGifts and secretsanta.

I am no stranger to complaining, trust me, but I know that misery loves company. When we have a stream of complainers in r/secretsanta it brings down the whole vibe, so this subreddit here is where misery truly loves company.

Go at it, have fun but don't bring it into r/secretsanta anymore please.

Under $2.00 gift for a fandom I don't follow and initially had no idea what it was.

Unbelievable. I seriously wish they didn't even bother and let me get rematched. The worst of it is that there is no way to tell whether the mods/ admin did anything about it.

Just Venting, but Both my Santa’s kind of suck. One asked me all sorts of questions about my preferences and interests beyond what was in my profile but then sent me $7 dollars worth of dollar store candy that’s expired. Then the other Santa specifically sent me something that I asked to be avoided in my profile and in direct messages and only that one thing. Which I can’t even bring into the house because I have a small kid who will freak.

I was prepared for crappy gifts or getting ghosted but, why waste the energy asking about things if you’ve already decided on something or need to cheep out. For the record, I wasn’t being a diva in my likes, I have a range of interests and anything with a small bit of effort would have been great. I always put extra effort into picking for my giftees so that’s what I try to focus on.

Seriously.. last christmas I got my giftee something awesome that she wanted. Not even a thanks or a confirmation that she got it. Then the teacher exchange, zero acknowledgement, final fantasy exchange, zero acknowledgement (at least on that one I used the redditgifts website so I get credit no matter what) But seriously.. is it so hard to confirm? The only exchange I've been in so far that has gone flawlessly is Sailor Moon. Which makes sense because the sailor moon fanbase is full of the best people :-)

So just as a side note, I live in Finland and maybe that has something to do with how horribly this went. So this happened last year. I bought my person an approximately 20 euro gift, wrapped it nicely and sent it out. I really put a lot of thought into what I got.

It was official disney merch since they liked disney. Anyway, the package got redirected to the pickup point nearest to their address, but it should've been fine because that place always sends a notice in the mail to pick up even if they don't have a receipant's phone number.

Person did not pick it up for whatever fucking reason. It got sent back to me, had to pay a fee to get it back LONG after Christmas. I sent it on time and everything btw. The person just wasn't bothered. And my own secret santa didn't send me anything at all. So I basically just lost money for no reason.

That being said, I also did the card exchange last year and got an adorable hand drawn card, so I may do that again in the future. :)

So, I had anticipated something a bit more, thoughtful. Instead, what I received were:

• A sticker based on engineering (which I’m not even an engineer)

• A stock image altered slightly. (It’s essentially Mercy’s head but with an effect on it)

Neither was wrapped, just randomly sent from Amazon with no attempt to even make them look like they were part of an exchange.

Seriously, it feels like my Secret Santa didn’t even try. They sent out gifts immediately and missed everything I liked.

I’m seriously bummed out haha. Happy holidays I guess. At least my secret Santa will be getting a nice gift worth more than 14$

Sent great gifts during one of the last exchanges, my first one. Got shafted. Re-gifter sent me a bag of dog shit. I message the mods, and they're like, "It's not about receiving, it's about giving!" I get livid, and tell them that this disgusting and certainly not a gift. Mods call me "selfish". Wow.

I spent so much time this year agonizing over what I should get my giftee, I wont be the person that just gifts a gift that has nothing to do with their interests because its cheap and "oh well they should like it because they have to".

But 2nd year in a row, wtf. This year I got a notebook and a marker set. Nowhere did I say i was even remotely interested in writing or coloring.

Idk if I am just in an ungrateful mood or what but really. If you can't afford the $20 minimum at least, you shouldn't do it at all.

I feel like a jerk for being so disappointed in what I received for secret santa, it was my first time doing this but... really. 5 lbs of grape gummi bears.

I spent so much time and effort into picking what I would gift to my giftee, it sucks that people just sign up and gift whatever is laying around the house, no thought just: oh crap, if I wanna keep getting good gifts I need to send something.

Okay so I know that it is only a sticker exchange but we spent a few hours to find the right stuff for her Santa. Then when we got in we checked the mail and this shit was here. She said she liked magic the gathering and nerdy stuff. We weren’t expecting much but a few mtg logos would be nice for a deck box or two. What we got was some bull shit bible quotes and stuff about prayer. My fiancé isn’t Christian and is a bit let down. I mean I’m all for religion but this just feels rude you know.

There seems to be a simple solution to this problem.

Gifters should be required to submit a photo of their gift along with shipping by a certain date. If they don't, they are out and they rematch all those who had a shit Santa.

OR start charging to participate in this. Have a free version and you take your risk OR have a paid version -for added security. Make it $20.00 to participate -one time fee! this way you weed out those cheap people who are looking for "free" gifts who won't pay to participate. Make it that if you are successful and give a gift on time, that is good and not 8 1ft extension cords, you get to stay in the premium exchanges. That way if people get shafted you can give them at a bare minimum a $20 credit to Amazon or something .... to make up for it.

There is much much much more Reddit can do to safe guard and make this much more enjoyable for everyone - but they don't care.

I've been doing the Reddit secret Santa exchange for a few years and have gotten "eh" gifts but this one took the cake. It was so bad I took it back to the post office and paid (shipping was more than the items worth) to have it returned to sender just because I was so angry. I look forward to this every year and put tons of thought in and to have someone send garbage gets me riled up.

So of the 10 exchanges I have done, I have gotten some really poor gifts half the time and been shafted once (no rematch). I have gotten a set of wall sticker designed for a four year old (even though I specified no wall decorations), a comic book from a series I don't read even though I, also, specifically said to not send me volumes of any series to err on the side of caution, the list goes on.

This one takes the cake though. I was sent a $20 gift card for amazon. How impersonal can you be . . .? But oh, it doesn't matter. It's the giving anyway. I spent $80 on my giftee and bought them things related directly to their interests. I even stalked their reddit profile and found out we were fans of the same video game and sent them some merch from that fandom.

They posted their reaction to the gift and they didn't even thank me, just a list of "I got this and this." I messaged them if everything was okay with their gifts and they said "you didn't buy me anything on my wish list."

Everything on their wish list was $150+

I was really excited to join my first Reddit Secret Santa Exchange ever since the last Christmas when my gf first told me about it. I've been a Reddit user for 4 years now, but I never knew SS is a thing here. I was looking forward to it not because I like shopping for gifts or receiving gifts in particular, but basically it was just a whole lot of curiosity. Knowing Reddit as a community, I was really interested to see what other Redditor could possibly get me, and I wanted to try something new.

Anyways, fast forward to now, as you've probably already guessed what's the story here. Of course, my Secret Santa pulled my info one time back in November, then went dead silent, no gift shipped, no message, no nothing. I just hope that asshole is gonna enjoy whatever he gets from his SS.

And yes, people on r/secretsanta keep saying how this is about giving and not receiving. But you know what? I think that's total BS. This is a GIFT EXCHANGE, not a GIFT DONATION. You give something to get something. If I wanted to randomly spend $20, donating it to the homeless would be way more beneficial than sending a gift to a random Reddit user.

Another funny thing is seeing how common thing this is. So many people getting screwed. But not a SINGLE mention on the official subreddit. It's like this wonderland where everybody is happy and nothing bad ever happens. BS.

Also what pissed me off even before the shipping deadline were people posting their super expensive, loaded packages, all wrapped in the fanciest wrapping paper, spending hundreds and hundreds on this exchange, even though it clearly says you should spend about $20. That just puts unrealistic expectations in many people's eyes. And then we get Santas who put a lot of thought into their gift but are ignored or straight up dissed by their ungrateful giftees (expecting fancy vacations, like in that other post on this sub).

TL;DR. Joined Secret Santa for the first time. Got screwed. Official subreddit acts like it's a magical fairy land. Rich kids racing who's gonna post the most expensive gift. No thank you, I'm gonna give some cash to the homeless instead.

(posting this from a throwaway)

edit: words

My first Secret Santa last year I didn't even receive a gift and did not get rematched. I later signed up for a snack exchange and put together a gift box of a selection of things from one of my favorite stores, a Japanese $1.50 store. I received two snacks delivered by Amazon that were ok, not unique or exciting in any way.

This year I considered not bothering to sign up for Secret Santa given my last two experiences but decided to try just to see what it really feels like to get a cool gift. I sent (via Amazon) a remote-controller beeper tag set that was $20, right at the official recommended minimum. I finally got my gift today but was disappointed to pull out "Made in China" steak knives from Amazon. They are $8. It's also disappointing that the gift doesn't seem to have a whole lot of thought in it. I talked about my hobby of cooking in my info, but what kind of cook doesn't have steak knives, especially an $8 set?

All three of my experiences with these gift exchanges have been disappointing. I won't be signing up for anymore. Needed to vent.

So first time doing secret santa I ended up getting shafted and this time I wish I got shafted because they felt the need to give me an item that costs 50 cents.

I was really excited for the first secret santa. I had signed up for two people thinking that I'd be able to support that, but I was a little too optimistic about what I could reasonably do, and it all kinda fell apart. I'm sorry theleaderisgood and colonelmustard (I think that's who I was supposed to gift to - my laptop I'd saved the info on broke and never came back from the service folks). Life just wasn't co-operating with me, and between a paycheck getting lost for a week and some other circumstances, I wasn't able to carry out the commitment I'd signed myself into.

Anyway, I didn't mean to no-show when it came time to gift, but I hope that you two aren't too discouraged. If there was some way for me to confirm that those two were the ones I was supposed to gift, I'd be more than happy to try to do something, now. Though my salary's still pretty pitiful, I'm doing a good bit better than I was in December, and I really would like to do a little something for you two.

I don't mean to complain, and I recognize that this is just one of the risks inherent in participating in a massive online Secret Santa, but this has been bothering me and I wanted to vent. Using a throwaway and being vague about specifics because I don't want any drama.

I enjoy participating in Secret Santa, and my giftee gave a lot of very useful information in their exchange preferences. I already had ideas for some presents, but decided to check out their profile to see if I could find any additional information about what exactly they might enjoy. You can imagine my surprise when I saw that a lot of their activity is in a hate sub specifically centred on hatred of a group I'm part of, and that they've repeatedly used slurs that apply to me.

I signed up to do this, and so did they, and obviously I was still going to do my part. I bought a couple of thoughtful gifts, wrote out a card, wrapped them nicely and shipped them off.

I'm not saying that people who participate in controversial subreddits shouldn't be allowed to participate in Secret Santa. I'm sure my Reddit history has comments that my Santas might have disagreed with. But it's difficult to grit your teeth and spend money buying something for someone who was posting a week ago about how you don't deserve to exist. I get that mods can't constantly be changing people's matches just because their Santa doesn't like whoever they were assigned, but I wish there could be exceptions in situations like this.